Congested corner to see improvement

Land too pricey for roundabout at Cleveland and Fir roads.

Land too pricey for roundabout at Cleveland and Fir roads.

January 03, 2009|JEFF PARROTT Tribune Staff Writer

When she can, Erin Good avoids the oddly shaped intersection of Cleveland and Fir roads, where drivers back up one behind the other and wait their turn. To reach the Grape Road commercial area from her home in the Fairfield Estates subdivision, northeast of Fir and Indiana 23, she usually takes Brick Road instead. So she was glad to hear Friday that city of Mishawaka and St. Joseph County leaders plan to widen the intersection and install traffic lights. "It definitely is a great idea," Good said. "Come 5 or 6 o'clock at night, with people coming home from work, it is just crowded." County officials initially explored a roundabout, but buying up right of way would have been too expensive because land is so valuable there. Under an interlocal agreement signed by county commissioners earlier this week, the city will pay $400,000 in engineering costs to design the new intersection, plus $100,000 toward construction, although it sits outside city limits. In exchange, the county will pay $400,000 toward a new 10-foot-wide sidewalk across the Mishawaka Avenue bridge near the city's Merrifield Park. Ken Prince, Mishawaka city planner, said the intersection improvement will benefit the city now because so many drivers enter the city's Main Street/Grape Road area from the Indiana Toll Road, Granger and Elkhart. The city also is looking to the future. It already has annexed about 80 of the 120 acres of vacant land from the Toll Road/Capital Avenue interchange to Indiana 23. "Five to 10 years from now this (intersection) might be in the city," Prince said. "Because of that future growth we think will happen, we think this is the prime opportunity to partner with them to get this accomplished." The new intersection could cost up to $2.5 million to build, or perhaps less, depending on survey work yet to be done, said county engineer Jessica Clark. The county will pay 20 percent, or about $500,000, with the federal government funding the rest. Because so many vehicles sit idle at the congested corner, belching exhaust, the intersection work qualified for partial federal air quality improvement funding. Clark said the city will hire a firm to design the intersection early this year, but construction probably won't begin until 2011. Unfortunately, that's how long it takes to move a project involving right-of-way acquisition through the federal aid process, Clark said. For the Mishawaka Avenue bridge reconstruction, the county will install the widened sidewalk, which will let the city extend its Riverwalk across the river. That reconstruction should start in the fall and is expected to last at least 15 months, meaning the bridge would be closed through the end of 2010, Prince said. The Mishawaka Board of Public Works was expected to consider the interlocal agreement at its upcoming meeting Tuesday.Staff writer Jeff Parrott: jparrott@sbtinfo.com (574) 235-6320